Qantas pushes international flight restart back to October
James ChappleQantas hopes to restart regular flights to "most" of its international destinations, including London, from 31 October – four months later than its initial July aim.
The airline said the new date aligns with the expected timeframe for Australia’s complete Covid-19 vaccine roll-out.
Capacity will be lower than pre-Covid levels, with frequencies and aircraft deployment on each route matched to the recovery in each market.
Qantas said it did not expect international passenger capacity to fully recover to pre-Covid levels until 2024.
It is assessing the use of digital health pass apps to support the resumption of Covid-safe international travel, with CommonPass and Iata’s Travel Pass currently being trialled on its ongoing repatriation flight programme.
From 31 October, Qantas hopes to resume flights to 22 of its 25 pre-Covid international destinations – including London, Los Angeles, Singapore and Johannesburg.
The airline won’t, however, initially resume direct flights to New York, Santiago or Osaka, but said it "remained committed" to flying to all three destinations.
Customers will be able to fly to these destinations under codeshare partnerships or via arrangements with oneworld alliance partner airlines.
Qantas has extended its Fly Flexible policy to all international flights booked from 25 February through to the end of April to boost confidence, allowing flight dates to be changed, for free, to any date available for sale at the time, although customers will have to pay any fare differences.
Credit vouchers, meanwhile, have been extended and can now be redeemed for any travel through to the end of 2023.
Any customers with international bookings affected by the extension to the airline’s proposed restart date will be contacted and offered alternatives.
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James Chapple
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Place of registration: England and Wales.
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